A Chalice of Wind (20 page)

“What are you doing?”

“Packing. There’s coffee made downstairs, but you’re on your own for breakfast.”

“Why are you packing? Are we going somewhere?” A nervous flutter started in the pit of my stomach. Nan had been acting oddly since right before we’d found out about Thais.

“Not you—just me,” she said, folding an Indian cotton top. She lifted Q-Tip out of the suitcase again and packed it.

“What’s going
on?
”

Nan’s calm, blue-gray eyes regarded me. “I need to go away for a while. I’m not sure how long. While I’m gone, you need to be extra careful, completely on guard. Don’t trust anything or anyone. If anyone gives you a message they say came from me, don’t believe them. If I need to contact you, I’ll do it directly.”

My mouth dropped open. “Where are you going? What’s happening?”

“I need to take care of some things,” she said. I saw that she had gathered some spellcraft supplies—crystals, small candles, essential oils, her copper bracelets. These she now put into a purple velvet bag and pulled the drawstring.

“ Tomorrow is Monday,” she said. “I expect you to go to school this week, complete the metal-study course we began, and go to your tutoring session with Melysa Hawkcraft on Tuesday.”

“You won’t be back by Tuesday?”

“I’m not sure,” she said. “I hope so, but I’m not sure. However, if I’m not back by Wednesday, I’ve left a letter for you in the cupboard in the workroom.” She gave me a wry, knowing smile. “Don’t bother trying to open it before Wednesday. It’s spelled—you won’t be able to. But come Wednesday, if I’m not back, you’ll read it and follow the instructions inside. Understand?”

“Yeah, I guess,” I said uncertainly. I hadn’t told Nan about getting a knife pulled on me the other night—I didn’t want her to say I couldn’t go out at night with my friends or something. But now the fear of that night rushed back with all Nan’s cryptic warnings and instructions. I didn’t want her to go like this.

Except. I would have the house to myself.

Andre could come over. Scared was one thing I wouldn’t be feeling if he were here.

Nan came over and put her hands on my shoulders. Looking deeply into my eyes, she said, “You’ll be okay, Clio. You’re seventeen, and the house is spelled with layers of protection. Just watch yourself, refresh the spells every night before you go to bed, and everything will be fine.” She put her head to one side, considering. “Do you want me to ask Racey’s parents if you can stay over there for a few days?”

“Let me try staying on my own,” I said. “If I get too freaked out, I’ll go to Racey’s.”

“Okay.” Nan hefted Q-Tip out one last time and closed her suitcase. I followed her downstairs, still in my nightgown, feeling a rising excitement. I would have the whole house to myself! The situation was clouded by worry about what Nan was going to “take care of,” but still.

At the front door, Nan put down her suitcase and we hugged. I had a sudden, unreasonable fear that this would be the last time I saw her or hugged her; that from this moment on I was on my own. Sappy tears sprang to my eyes, and I blinked them back. Everything was fine—Nan said so. I would be fine, she would come back. I would have a fun little free holiday, and then she would return and our lives would go on as they had before.

I was sure of it.

 

“Well,
that’s
bizarre,” Racey said, frowning. She’d met me at Botanika after lunch. The morning, after Nan had left, had stretched out surprisingly long and quiet. I’d called Racey and left a message for Andre. He never answered his phone, it seemed. “And she didn’t tell you where she was going or for what?”

“Nope. She was going out of town, not just off to a job or something.” In Nan’s work as a midwife, she had been gone overnight before, but just in the city. “It was weird, a bit alarming, yet—not without possibilities.” I gave Racey a meaningful look.

Her eyebrows rose. “Like what?” she asked, her tone hopeful.

“A
party,
for starters,” I said. “
Muchas
fiestas. All manner of merriment.” I waved my hand expansively. “Blender drinks. Fun magick, depending on who we invite. Unbridled teenage mayhem.”

Racey’s face lit as various possibilities bloomed in her mind. “Sweet! How many people do you want to invite?”

“Enough to make it fun. Not so many that the neighbors will call the cops.”

“Okay. Let’s make a list,” said Racey, pulling a pen out of her purse. I grinned. Racey was always very big on lists.

“The usual suspects, I assume,” she said, busily writing. “And guys. I’ll ask Della and Kris and Eugenie for ideas.”

“Good. And let’s make margaritas,” I said. “And oh! Get this! I’ll do a dampening spell around the house so people outside can’t hear the noise from inside! Then we can have loud music!”

“Brilliant,” Racey said admiringly, writing it down. “And food?”

Just then my macramé purse started wriggling on the table. Racey glanced up. “Your purse is ringing,” she said briefly while I dug for my phone.

Its small screen said
unlisted number.
I clicked the answer button.

“Hello?”

“Hey, babe.” Andre’s voice made my skin tingle. “I got your message. What’s up? Do you think you can see me today?”

“Oh,
yeah,
” I said with feeling. Smiling hugely, I leaned back in my chair and tried to ignore how Racey’s face had assumed a look of careful neutrality. “I can see a
lot
of you. In fact, I’m giving a party tonight—just you, me, and forty of my closest friends. Can you come?”

“At your house?” Andre sounded surprised—I’d never invited him over before.

“Yep.” I gave him the address and directions on how to get there. Uptown isn’t built on a grid—the streets follow the curve of the river. “Like, at nine? And—maybe you can stay and help after everyone else has gone.” I was practically quivering with anticipation.

“Help with what?” Andre sounded wary.

I shrugged. “Anything that needs doing. After all, with my grandmother out of town, I’ll be on my own. I’ll need all the help I can get.”

I could almost feel his interest quickening over the phone. “Your grandmother’s out of town?” he asked. “Since when?”

“Since this morning. I didn’t even know about it till I saw her packing. She’ll be gone a couple days at least.” For right now, I put away all my unease about when she was coming back. I would deal with it when the time came.

Andre was silent for a minute. “So you’re saying that your grandmother is out of town, leaving you alone in the house.”

“Uh-huh.” I took a sip of my drink, careful not to make slurping noises into the phone.

“And you, being the good granddaughter who gets home on time because you promised, are immediately seizing this opportunity to raise hell.”

I considered. “Pretty much, yeah.”

“And, tell me if I’m getting your meaning correctly, little Clio,” said Andre’s dark, delicious voice, “but are you suggesting that I stay with you after everyone has left, to, um, help you with . . . something?”

I could hardly breathe. The minute the front door closed after the last person, I was going to rip his clothes off. “ That’s right,” I managed to get out.

“Well, well, well,” he said, his tone making my heart beat faster. “That sounds like a very good idea. I would love to stay later and help you—with anything you want.”

With great self-control I avoided whimpering. “ Terrific,” I said, trying to sound together. “Anytime after nine.”

“Can I bring anything? Besides myself ?”

“Um, let’s see.” I thought quickly, glancing at Racey’s list. “Can you bring some tequila? For the margaritas?”

“It will be my pleasure.”

My eyes shut slowly and I swallowed. “Okay,” I said, barely able to speak. “See you then.” I clicked off my phone and took some deep breaths, as if recovering from running.

Racey was watching me shrewdly from across the table. “Don’t tell me,” she said. “Let me guess. He is, by some
miracle,
going to take you up on your offer.”

I regarded my best friend. “How come you don’t like him?” There, it was out in the open.

Racey looked taken aback. “I never said I didn’t like him. It’s just . . . you’re moving awful fast. You don’t really know him.”

“That’s never stopped us before,” I pointed out. Since we were fifteen, Racey and I had been wrapping the lesser sex around our pinkies. This was the first time she had encouraged me to put on the brakes. “What is it?”

Racey shifted her weight in her seat, looking uncomfortable. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “He’s different somehow than all the others.”

“Yeah,”
I said. “Absolutely.”

Racey still looked hesitant. “I don’t know what it is. He just makes me feel . . . cautious.”

I looked at her speculatively. Did Racey have the hots for Andre? I didn’t think so. I’d be able to pick up on it if she did. Well, they just didn’t click for some reason. I wasn’t going to worry about it.

“Okay,” I said, switching into party mode. “Show me your list. We gotta hit the store.”

“D
amn it!
Damn it!
Where the
hell
are they?”
Crash.

As a way to wake up, this was worse than an alarm clock but better than having a bucket of cold water dumped on my head. Next to me, Minou yawned and looked offended. I blinked groggily at my clock. Ten a.m. Another restless night had led me to sleep in.

But what was Axelle doing up so suspiciously early?

“ They were right
here!
” she shrieked from the living room.

I pulled on some gym shorts and cautiously made my way out to the main room. Axelle had torn the place apart—sofa cushions on the floor, a table overturned, the basket of kindling by the fireplace knocked over. Newspapers, magazines, and clothes were strewn everywhere.

In short, the place was even more of a wreck than usual, and guess who was the only person who would care enough to clean it up?

Still shouting, Axelle picked up my French-English dictionary and heaved it across the room. It smacked the opposite wall with force, which showed me that the door to the secret room was wide open, as if the search had started up there and spilled over into the secular area of the apartment.

“Hey!” I cried, hurrying over to get the book. “ That’s mine!”

Axelle looked up at me, wild-eyed. I’d never seen her so wiggy—usually she moved at a slinky, feline saunter, summoning energy only to decide what shoes went with which purse. But now she looked like she’d been up for hours, and even her characteristic silky, shiny black bob was totally mussed.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.“What are you looking for?”

“My cups!” she shrieked, grabbing handfuls of her hair, as if to keep a tenuous grip on her sanity. “Family heirlooms!”

I looked around, trying to remember whether I’d seen anything like that. “Were they silver, or crystal, or what?”

“ They were
wood!
” Axelle cried, distraught. “Carved cypress! They’re invaluable! I mean, for personal reasons! This is a
disaster!
”

“Wooden cups?” I felt a sense of dread come over me. “How many?” I already knew.

“Four!” Axelle cried, looking near tears. “Four wooden cups!” Then she seemed to catch something in my voice and looked up, her black eyes locking on me like lasers. “Why? Have you seen them? Four wooden cups?”

“Uh—” I froze like a frightened rabbit.

Axelle’s eyes narrowed, and then she rushed past me into my room. I saw my pillow fly out into the hall, heard her sweep all my stuff off my desk. Minou raced out of my room and disappeared. I clenched my hands at my sides, and then Axelle tore into my small bathroom.

Her howl was a mixture of relief, rage, and triumph.

Head bowed, dreading the inevitable, I shuffled toward the bathroom. Axelle was holding her carved wooden cups—the cups that had seemed so old and battered I was sure no one would miss them from the living room armoire. Her face glowed with intense emotion as she stared at the one that held cotton swabs, the one that held cotton balls. . . .

When she spoke, her voice was low and trembling. “ These four cups are the most valuable things you’ll ever see in your whole life. If you had ruined them—”

There was nothing I could say. I hadn’t known. If they were so valuable, why weren’t they upstairs in the locked room? I mean, they weren’t much to look at—just four old wooden cups.

With great effort, Axelle seemed to get herself under control. “From now on, ask if you borrow anything of mine.”

This was much more reasonable than she usually was, and I nodded, embarrassed. She swept out of the bathroom, having dumped the cups’ contents onto the floor, and then I heard her heading upstairs.

I sank down onto the closed toilet lid, my head in my hands. What a way to start a Sunday. I needed to get out of here. After all the emotion last night with Luc, I felt self-conscious about going to the garden to find him, like I needed to give us both a little time and space. I was also still burning to see Clio and Petra, get some more questions answered, spend time with them. I got up and headed for the phone.